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Russian-American journalist for Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty (RFE/RL) Alsu Kurmasheva, who is in custody after she was accused of violating Russia's law on foreign agents, attends a court hearing in Kazan, Russia May 31, 2024.
Hard Numbers: Russia jails another US journalist, Latinos warm to RFK Jr., Paris tightens security for Olympics, India looks to roll in the deep, HIV prevention milestone for Africa
6.5: A Russian court revealed on Monday that Russian-American journalist Alsu Kurmasheva was sentenced on Friday to 6.5 years in prison for “spreading false information” about the Russian army. Kurmasheva, a dual citizen who works for the US-funded Radio Free Liberty/Radio Europe service in Prague, was arrested while visiting her family in Russia in October. Her husband says the charges relate to a book of profiles of anti-war Russians that Kurmasheva edited. She is the second American journalist that Russia has sentenced to a lengthy prison term in the past four days alone.
24: ¿Latinos por Roberto? A new poll shows 24% of US Hispanic voters support third-party candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr. That’s nearly 10 points above the national average. Respondents were split 36 to 36 on Biden vs. Trump. The poll was taken before Biden dropped out of the race, but it illustrates the increasingly uphill battle that Democrats face in keeping the support of a traditionally blue voting group. Read our in-depth look at the “Latino vote” here.
30,000: France is not messing around when it comes to security for the Paris Olympics, which begin later this week. Authorities will deploy 30,000 police throughout the event, rising to 45,000 during peak times. Alongside them will be 15,000 French military personnel and nearly 2,000 foreign police. Security officials have already conducted hundreds of raids, arresting members of far-right, far-left, and jihadist groups suspected of planning attacks. At least two plots have reportedly been broken up already.
4: India wants to get into the deep-sea mining game as it tries to secure supplies of rare minerals critical for its economy and energy transition. New Delhi has already won several licenses for the Indian Ocean, but it’s eyeing a bigger prize: a vast swathe of the Pacific between Mexico and Hawaii. Experts say it will take India at least four years to develop the required skills and technology to compete with Asian rival China. In the meantime, international authorities are still working out rules for deep-sea mining.
56: For the first time ever, a majority of new HIV infections occurred outside of sub-Saharan Africa, a UN report says. The milestone, based on numbers from 2023, reflects sustained progress against the disease by governments in Africa – where new infections have fallen 56% since 2010. Globally, new infections have fallen 39% during that time. But experts warn that case numbers are currently rising elsewhere in the world, particularly in Eastern Europe and Central Asia, Latin America, and the Middle East and north Africa.
Russia's President Vladimir Putin and India's Prime Minister Narendra Modi walk during their meeting at the Novo-Ogaryovo state residence near Moscow, Russia July 8, 2024.
Indian PM Narendra Modi: a “bleeding heart” in Moscow
India’s Prime Minister Narendra Modi appeared to take a swipe at Vladimir Putin during their meeting in Moscow on Tuesday, even if only a subtle one.
Just moments after the Russian president welcomed him to the Kremlin, Modi lamented that his “heart bleeds” whenever children are killed in war.
A timeless statement, yes – but the timing itself was a statement: The day before, the two leaders embraced just hours after an apparent Russian airstrike destroyed a children’s cancer hospital in the Ukrainian capital of Kyiv.
Moscow has claimed, so far without evidence, that the hit came from a Ukrainian air defense system. The tragedy occurred as Moscow targeted cities across Ukraine with one of its biggest missile barrages in months.
The nonaligned line. Modi has, gently, criticized Putin’s invasion before, but the bigger picture remains the same: India has kept up good relations with Moscow throughout the war.
In part, that’s pragmatic. A rapidly growing Indian economy enjoys buying steeply discounted Russian oil. But it’s also ideological. Modi is keen to show that while he is glad to partner with the US over shared concerns about China, India – the most populous democracy and the fastest-growing major economy – has its own prerogatives.
Will Biden get caught up in the anti-incumbency trend?
A major question being asked from abroad this week is what recent global election results tell us about November’s US race. Will US politics get swept up by the anti-incumbent, anti-establishment sentiment seen elsewhere across 2024’s election cycle, eroding the longstanding US norm that current officeholders tend to be hard to displace? And what does this all mean for the particular contest between President Joe Biden and former President Donald Trump, jumpstarted by last week’s debate?
Already this year, incumbents in South Africa and India saw their majorities stricken, and Senegal’s elections brought an outsider to power. Still, Mexico’s election of Morena’s Claudia Sheinbaum pointed in a different direction. With this week’s elections in France, as well as the vote in the United Kingdom that’s almost certain to spell the end of Conservative Party rule, something fundamental appears to be shifting in incumbency politics with relevant signposts for November’s US election.
It seems clear that the emerging narrative from the current election cycle is a long-COVID story. Persistent inflation, higher-for-longer interest rates, cost-of-living pressures, and elevated unemployment rates are driving voting behavior. Global voters are finding their pocketbooks lighter than before the pandemic, regardless of what their politicians or treasury department statistics may tell them. In 2024, perception has become reality, and this spells peril for incumbents.
The post-pandemic reckoning around the economic recovery that is taking place this election season may be driving voters away from the center and toward the extremes. One headline from last month's EU Parliament elections was that the center held, and yet, viewed from another perspective, the rise of the right-wing cannot be overlooked. Call it pragmatism, tactical populism, whatever you like — further-right and further-left political parties and politicians are finding themselves inside governments from Italy to Argentina. These movements have now set their sights on France, the UK, and the US.
When UK Prime Minister Rishi Sunak called a snap election for July 4, it felt like an inauspicious date to have chosen for what is likely to be “independence” from 14 years of Tory party rule. That’s a stunning duration of time that masks a declining trajectory since 2021, with roots likely in 2016’s Brexit referendum. Sunak’s snap call has awoken Nigel Farage and the right-wing Reform UK party, which according to the latest polling, is a stone’s throw from overtaking the Tories for a second-place finish. This means that as Labour readies for a win, the most dominant political party for nearly a decade and a half faces an extinction-level political event.
While the party system in the US may be on a stronger footing than the UK this election cycle, parallels for the US election can still be drawn. It has long been said that US politics is polarized and that left-right fault lines are increasingly deep, allowing for fewer points of convergence.According to polling conducted 10 years ago, the share of Americans expressing consistently conservative or consistently liberal viewpoints doubled in two decades. The 2014 story was not only a polarization story, but also a partisan one. Ten years ago, people felt more conservative (or liberal) and more intensely identified as Republican (or Democrat) than in the past. Jumping forward to today, it is a near-truism that there is little common ground between the two political sides, and the gap is widening. According to the American National Election Studies’latest data, affective polarization has accelerated over the last decade. Today, only 21% of Democrats report positive feelings for Republicans, and only 18% of Republicans report positive feelings for their Democratic counterparts.
As a consequence of these trends, President Joe Biden has tried moving further to the left on certain issues to address the risk of “uncommitted” voters as well as younger and more progressive voting blocs. On the other side, former President Donald Trump, rather than seeking to appeal to more moderate voters, is sticking with messages about an (economic) “blood bath” that appeal to his base. In a sign of the times, polling in May found that “political extremism and threats to democracy” trails only the economy as the most important problem facing the country ahead of November’s elections. And in troubling news for Biden’s reelection camp, voters tend to trust Trump – at least on the economy – more than the president.
Politics may be cyclical. But cycles can be generational. With roughly half of the world’s population taking to the polls this year, who will be leading and what policies they set at home will have consequences beyond borders and for years to come. The post-pandemic reckoning taking place across India, South Africa, and Mexico is building momentum that hits Europe this week. By November, the US may find itself caught up in this global tide, driving disaffected voters from the familiar middle ground and toward the poles, bringing potentially bad news for today’s incumbents.
Lindsay Newman is the practice head of Global Macro, Geopolitics for Eurasia Group and is based in London. She writes the Views on America column for GZERO.
A group of people thought to be migrants arrive in Dungeness, Kent, after being rescued in the Channel by the RNLI following following a small boat incident.
Hard Numbers: UK vote may scrap Rwanda plan, Orban visits Ukraine, India mulls marital rape, Bannon reports for prison, Beryl turns deadly, Fuji for a price
320 million: If, as widely expected, the Labour Party wins Thursday’s national elections in the UK and scraps the outgoing government’s controversial plan to send asylum-seekers to Rwanda, the British government will have spent more than £320 million that can’t be recovered. Labour has pledged instead to spend state funds to build a new Border Security Command that dismantles the people-smuggling gangs that help asylum-seekers cross the English Channel in small boats.
1:Viktor Orbán, Hungary’s prime minister and Europe’s most pro-Russian leader, made an unexpected visit to Kyiv for talks with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky. This marks Orbán’s first trip to Ukraine since Russia’s full-scale invasion began. The visit coincides with Hungary assuming the rotating EU presidency, which happened despite concerns from other European politicians over Hungary’s frequent clashes with Brussels. Discussions are expected to focus on peace possibilities and bilateral relations between Hungary and Ukraine.
36: India’s supreme court has promised to rule later this month on whether India’s much-anticipated new penal code will make it acrime for a man to rape his wife. For now, India is one of the world’s 36 countries that have not criminalized marital rape.
4: Former Donald Trump advisor Steve Bannon reported to prison on Monday. He’ll now serve afour-month sentence for contempt of Congress after defying a subpoena from the House committee that investigated the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the US Capitol. Bannon, who has called himself a “political prisoner,” remains influential with pro-Trump conservatives.
5: Hurricane Beryl, a Category 5 storm with sustained winds of 165 mph, caused widespread destruction across the southeast Caribbean on Monday, killing at least two people. Beryl is the first Atlantic hurricane of the season.
12: Early Monday, Japan’s park rangers began a crackdown on the surge of visitors hoping to walk up the iconic Mount Fuji. Climbers will now have to pay 2,000 yen (about $12) to hit the trails, and the number of hikers will be limited to 4,000 a day to limit the overcrowding and litter that have drawn more complaints in recent years.
Hurricane Beryl makes its way to the Caribbean's Windward Islands, in a composite image from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) GOES-East weather satellite June 30, 2024.
Hard Numbers: Beryl barrels toward land, Deadly bombings hit Nigeria, Incumbent leads in Mauritania, India beats South Africa at cricket
1st: Hurricane season’s first big storm has a name: Beryl. Strengthening into a Category 4 storm on Sunday, Beryl is rolling into the Caribbean with 130-mph winds and is expected to reach the Windward Islands in the West Indies early Monday.
18: Suicide bombings have killed at least 18, and possibly as many as 30, people in northeastern Nigeria. No group has claimed responsibility yet, but police say that female bombers struck a wedding and a funeral in Gwoza, in Borno State on Saturday. The region is home to Boko Haram’s Islamist insurgency, which has displaced more than two million people, and Islamic State West Africa Province has carried out similar bombings in Borno state.
55: The West African nation of Mauritania also went to the polls on Saturday, and by Sunday, President Mohamed Ould Ghazouani had was leading with 56% of the vote, according to results from more than 90% of polling stations. His closest rival had garnered just 23% of the vote, so the pro-Western Ghazouani – whose election in 2019 was the country’s first peaceful transition of power since independence in 1960 – looks set for another five-year term.
13: Indian cricket fans are celebrating after the country’s triumph Saturday in the Cricket World Cup, where it beat South Africa by seven runs to end a 13-year dry spell, in a dramatic display of bowling and fielding. This was India’s second T20 World Cup win – the last time it won was in 2007 – and its first international cricket win since clinching the 2011 ICC Cricket World Cup.Apulia [Italy], Jun 15 (ANI): Prime Minister Narendra Modi departs from Italy to New Delhi, on Friday.
Will Modi try to mediate the Gaza conflict?
Historically, India has supported the Palestinian cause and advocated for a two-state solution. Under Modi’s leadership, however, Indiaincreased ties with Israel, including defense cooperation, technological exchange, and economic ties. Domestically, Modi has also faced blowback for a Hindu-nationalist agenda that critics say marginalizes the Muslim community. Indiabacked a UNGA resolution last year in favor of a cease-fire in Gaza but hasn’t made efforts to push for a truce unilaterally.
Does Mustafa see an opportunity? His renewed appeal comes amida possible shift in India’s foreign policy positions. With Modi’s BJP now lacking an absolute majority, coalition partners could influence policy decisions, including the government’s stance on the Israel-Hamas war. Observers also believe Modi’s desire to position India as a global player – and peacemaker – could incite his government to play a larger role in the conflict. Stay tuned.Indian Army soldiers participate in a war exercise during a two-day "Know Your Army" exhibition in Ahmedabad, India, August 19, 2016.
The foreigners doing the dying in Ukraine
In the latest dustup over foreign fighters dying for Russia in Ukraine, New Delhi wants the Kremlin to send home the remains of two Indians killed in the war.
The demands follow earlier complaints from India – which has maintained close ties with Moscow – that Russian recruiters are luring Indian citizens into the fight under false pretenses.
Indians aren’t alone. Over the past year, with Russian casualties climbing, Moscow has recruited thousands of fighters from countries across Central Asia, South Asia, and Africa. Recruiters offer $2,000 per month and promise either to fast-track Russian passports (or to revoke Russian visas for people already in the country).
The Kremlin also recruits from Russian jails – a new study says 88% of Russian casualties in the battle of Bakhmut last fall were plucked from prisons.
Why is the Kremlin recruiting foreigners and jailbirds? Simple: Russia’s advances in Ukraine have come at a huge human cost, and President Vladimir Putin doesn’t want more of his own shrinking population to bear the brunt.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, of course, can relate: Ukraine, facing its own manpower shortfalls, says 20,000 fighters are in its foreign legion, and Kyiv has relied heavily on foreigners for training.
Want more? GZERO’s Alex Kliment and Molly Rubin profiled some of the foreigners training Ukrainian soldiers on the battlefield. See the video here.NEW DELHI, INDIA - JUNE 4: Prime Minister Narendra Modi, BJP National President JP Nadda, Rajnath Singh and Amit Shah during celebration at BJP HQ as the party leads in the Lok Sabha elections amid the counting of votes, on June 4, 2024 in New Delhi, India.
India’s Narendra Modi – chastened?
Indian PM Narendra Modi still got more votes than any democratically elected leader in history (winning an election in a billion-strong country will do that). But his Bharatiya Janata Party suffered a humbling setback, losing nearly 60 seats and failing to secure an outright majority for the first time since coming to power in 2014. At last count, the Party of Modi had 240 seats out of 543.
Why did support slip for a popular leader credited with making India the world’s fastest-growing major economy and a leading voice of the Global South? Perhaps, after a decade in power, there was Modi fatigue. Maybe Modi’s polarizing Hindu-nationalist rhetoric didn’t play as well as he’d hoped. And give credit to the opposition alliance – led by the long-struggling Indian National Congress – which exceeded expectations (and polls) by capitalizing on widespread frustrations about inflation and unemployment.
What next? The BJP is still the legislature’s largest party, but it will need smaller and regional parties to form a government. That may mean slower progress on key but difficult reforms – to land ownership, labor laws, and tariffs – that are part of Modi’s dream of making India a global manufacturing powerhouse.
The biggest questions: Can Modi, a strongman-curious leader used to having his way, learn to be a team player? Can a once-powerful Congress party, which has been in the wilderness for a decade, turn this moment into a new lease on life?